THE COMPANY

Heartrunner Sweden AB was created in 2016 and is formed by private investors with medical background, technical experts and Karolinska Institutet innovations AB

Background

Early a gloomy November morning one of the founders, a professor in cardiology sat on the bus to work but something delayed departure. The bus was filled with frustrated commuters and confusion arose, but eventually the bus took off, and an ambulance rushed to a stop.

Later, it turned out that a woman had collapsed from a cardiac arrest at the bus stop and the delay was due to this.

When he realized that he had been sitting so close to a victim of a cardiac arrest but completely unaware that his lifesaving skills was needed, an idea was born.

In 2007, the simple but ingenious idea was realized, to use cellphones to alert skilled volunteers to cardiac arrests, and encourage them to perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) before ambulance arrives.

In 2007 the idea was awarded “Idea of the year” in Sweden 2007 and “Service of the year” in 2012.

Science

In late 2008, the outlines of a scientific research project took form. The idea was to increase the rate of bystander CPR by alerting volunteers using text messages and to prove the value with a randomized controlled trial.

The scientific project started in Stockholm County in 2009 and in 2014 the trial was finished. The results showed a significant increase in bystander CPR rate in the cases where volunteer lifesavers were alerted and the results was published in New England Journal of Medicine 2015. (länk)

At the moment, scientific evaluations of the benefits of alerting volunteers to AEDs with the Heartrunner app is planned in Sweden and Denmark where the system is currently active.